Best Self-Hosted Ad Blockers in 2026

Quick Picks

Use Case	Best Choice	Why
Best overall	AdGuard Home	Built-in DoH/DoT/DoQ, DHCP, per-client rules, clean UI
Best community	Pi-hole	Largest community, most integrations, proven track record
Best lightweight	Blocky	30 MB RAM, YAML config, native encrypted DNS, no UI overhead
Best full DNS server	Technitium	Authoritative zones, recursive DNS, clustering, DHCP, comprehensive UI

The Full Ranking

1. AdGuard Home — Best Overall

AdGuard Home is the most complete self-hosted DNS ad blocker. It combines a clean web UI, ad blocking, encrypted DNS (DoH/DoT/DoQ/DNSCrypt), DHCP, per-client filtering rules, parental controls, and Safe Search enforcement in a single, lightweight binary. Setup takes five minutes and it works out of the box.

Pros:

• Clean, modern web UI
• Built-in DoH/DoT/DoQ/DNSCrypt — no add-ons
• Per-client filtering rules
• DHCP server
• Parental controls + Safe Search
• DNS rewrites for local network
• Low resource usage (~60-80 MB RAM)
• Single container deployment

Cons:

• No built-in Prometheus metrics (uses custom stats API)
• No native multi-instance sync
• Smaller community than Pi-hole

Best for: Most users. The best balance of features, simplicity, and resource usage.

Read our full guide: How to Self-Host AdGuard Home

2. Pi-hole — Best Community

Pi-hole is the original self-hosted DNS ad blocker and has the largest community by far. It provides network-wide ad blocking with a detailed dashboard, query logging, and DHCP. It’s been the default recommendation since 2015 and has thousands of guides, integrations, and community-maintained blocklists.

Pros:

• Largest community (50K+ GitHub stars, 300K+ Reddit)
• Most third-party integrations
• Detailed query log dashboard
• DHCP server
• Extensive blocklist ecosystem
• Thousands of guides and tutorials
• Proven track record (since 2015)

Cons:

• No built-in encrypted DNS (needs Unbound or cloudflared add-on)
• No per-client rules without group management (less intuitive)
• Higher resource usage (~120-180 MB RAM)
• Larger Docker image (~300 MB)

Best for: Users who want the biggest community, most integrations, and don’t mind adding Unbound for encrypted DNS.

Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Pi-hole

3. Blocky — Best Lightweight

Blocky is a YAML-configured DNS proxy that strips away the web UI to deliver the fastest, lightest DNS ad blocker available. It supports DoH/DoT natively, per-client filtering, DNSSEC validation, conditional forwarding, and Prometheus metrics — all in a 15 MB image using 30 MB of RAM.

Pros:

• Extremely lightweight (~30 MB RAM, 15 MB image)
• YAML configuration (version control friendly)
• Native DoH/DoT — no add-ons
• Built-in DNSSEC validation
• Built-in Prometheus metrics
• Multi-instance sync via Redis
• Per-client filtering in config
• Runs from scratch image (minimal attack surface)

Cons:

• No web UI (API only)
• Smaller community
• Requires comfort with YAML configuration
• No DHCP server
• Less third-party documentation

Best for: Infrastructure-as-code users, resource-constrained hardware, users who don’t need a web dashboard.

Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Blocky

4. Technitium DNS — Best Full DNS Server

Technitium DNS is a complete DNS server that includes ad blocking as one of many features. It can serve as a recursive resolver, authoritative nameserver, DNS proxy, and ad blocker simultaneously. The web UI covers zone management, DNSSEC, clustering, DHCP, and all DNS protocols.

Pros:

• Full recursive DNS (no forwarding needed)
• Authoritative DNS zone hosting
• Split-horizon DNS
• DNS clustering (v14+)
• Built-in DoH/DoT/DoQ
• DHCP server
• Comprehensive web UI
• Two-factor auth on admin (v14+)
• Built-in backup/restore

Cons:

• Overkill for pure ad blocking
• More complex web UI (many options)
• Higher resource usage (~150-300 MB)
• Smaller ad-blocking community
• Single-developer project (though very active)

Best for: Homelabbers who want one tool for all DNS needs — ad blocking, zone hosting, recursive resolution, and infrastructure management.

Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Technitium DNS

Full Comparison Table

Feature	AdGuard Home	Pi-hole	Blocky	Technitium
Web UI	Yes (clean)	Yes (detailed)	No	Yes (comprehensive)
Ad blocking	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
DoH/DoT (client)	Built-in	Add-on	Built-in	Built-in
DoH/DoT (server)	Built-in	No	Built-in	Built-in
DoQ	Built-in	No	No	Built-in
DHCP	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
Recursive DNS	No	Via Unbound	No	Built-in
Authoritative DNS	No	No	No	Yes
Zone hosting	No	No	No	Yes
Clustering	No	Community	Redis	Built-in (v14+)
Per-client rules	Yes	Groups	YAML	Yes
Parental controls	Yes	Blocklist	Blocklist	Blocklist
Safe Search	Yes	No	No	No
DNSSEC	Upstream validation	Via Unbound	Built-in (v0.28+)	Built-in
Prometheus metrics	No	Community	Built-in	No
2FA on admin	No	No	N/A	Yes (v14+)
Regex blocking	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Idle RAM	~60-80 MB	~120-180 MB	~30-50 MB	~150-300 MB
Docker image	~50 MB	~300 MB	~15 MB	~250 MB
GitHub stars	27K+	50K+	5K+	5K+

How We Evaluated

1. Ad blocking effectiveness — all use the same blocklist format, so effectiveness depends on lists, not software. Scored equally.
2. Feature completeness — encrypted DNS, DHCP, per-client rules, admin features.
3. Resource efficiency — RAM, disk, and CPU usage on typical hardware.
4. Ease of setup — time from docker compose up to blocking ads.
5. Community and documentation — guides, integrations, support resources.
6. Maintenance burden — how much ongoing work each solution requires.

FAQ

Do these block YouTube ads?

Partially. YouTube serves ads from the same domains as content (*.googlevideo.com), making DNS-level blocking unreliable for YouTube specifically. All four solutions have this same limitation. For YouTube ads, use uBlock Origin in your browser alongside DNS blocking.

Can I run two DNS ad blockers for redundancy?

Yes. Run two instances (e.g., Pi-hole on one device and AdGuard Home on another) and set both as DNS servers in your router. If one goes down, the other continues blocking. For same-software redundancy: Pi-hole has Gravity Sync, Blocky has Redis sync, and Technitium has clustering.

Which blocklists should I use?

Start with these:

• Steven Black Unified Hosts — comprehensive, well-maintained
• Hagezi Pro — excellent balance of blocking vs. false positives
• OISD — curated, low false positives

All four solutions support hosts-format lists interchangeably.

Can I run this on a Raspberry Pi?

Yes, all four. Pi-hole was designed for Pi hardware. AdGuard Home and Blocky run comfortably on a Pi 4 or Pi 5. Technitium works on Pi 4+ (ARM64 required). A Pi is ideal — low power, always-on, dedicated.

What about Unbound?

Unbound is a recursive DNS resolver, not an ad blocker. Pair it with Pi-hole for recursive resolution + ad blocking, or use Technitium which has recursive DNS built in. AdGuard Home and Blocky forward to upstream resolvers (Cloudflare, Quad9) over encrypted DNS, which is simpler and nearly as private as running your own recursive resolver.

Related

• How to Self-Host Pi-hole
• How to Self-Host AdGuard Home
• How to Self-Host Blocky
• How to Self-Host Technitium DNS
• Pi-hole vs AdGuard Home
• Pi-hole vs Blocky
• Pi-hole vs Technitium
• AdGuard Home vs Blocky
• Self-Hosted Alternatives to Google DNS
• Self-Hosted Alternatives to NextDNS
• Docker Compose Basics
• DNS Explained
• Getting Started with Self-Hosting